OK, quick backstory. I graduated from University in 2009 with a Masters in Graphic Design and Visual Communication, having studied graphic design since I was 16 at college.

Since graduating I have applied for around 500 design-related positions within the UK (where I reside) and abroad. These include internships, full-time, part-time, freelance and agency-based work. I have had no luck at all in terms of finding employment in the industry I love, with rarely as much as an reply acknowledging my application or interest.

The replies that I have had include gems such as being told I can work for them full-time without pay for 2 years then they would consider giving me a wage and an email telling me that I was talentless since I failed to get a 1st in my degree. I am not joking.

My question is am I alone in this or is the industry now so enclosed and full of already established designers that new graduates are unable to become a part of it? Also how long did it take for any employed designers on the Reddit to find their starting jobs?

As a successful designer with successful designer buddies I have come to the following conclusions as to why you(and other entry level designers) may be having a problem that don't include "Your work is meh" and "You aren't trying hard enough."

You have to consider the following:

• Location: If you are in an area where the market is over saturated and there just aren't enough jobs to go around, of course you are going to have a bad time. You need to be in a forward thinking city with lots of opportunity for design, freelance or firm. Consider moving to a city with lots of firms and competition. I recommend either New York, NY or Portland, OR (Why Portland? W+K, Laika, Nike, Intel, indy newspapers and a slew of coffee shops and small successful businesses for freelance).

• Generic Skill Set: A lot of kids with design degrees do a great job of pigeon holing their abilities. Great, you can make brochures, and set type. What a lot aren't good at that are must-haves in the field are print prep, web development, film editing, marketing/branding, and advertising. Advertising is an artform that a lot of designers claim they have, but they fail on so many levels. I'm talking about magazine and newspaper ad prep and getting your viewership to circulate through your work. I'm so happy that my first job was with a newspaper because I got to learn so many of these skills that no design school has ever thoroughly taught. Just because you know the programs doesn't mean you have the skill set to land a proper job.

I would really recommend sharing your resume and/or portfolio with us or in /r/design_critiques. Sometimes, people's work is just not up to snuff, and there is a hard reality about it. No assumptions are being made of you.

Hope this helps. Good luck.

EDIT: I need to note one more thing...

Where and how you apply to a job can be super discouraging. In other words:

Craigslist is fucking bullshit: Do not use craigslist as your only sole venue for applying/searching for jobs. You are wasting your time. The real jobs are going to be through company websites, showing up in person and making personal connections. Go to design lectures and network. Ask your teachers if they have any leads or if they know anyone hiring for entry level postions. In case you aren't convinced that your area is over saturated with designers (and more than likely, bad ones), I always propose this experiment to people:

1) Make a fake email for a fake business

2) Make a fake posting on craigslist for an entry level design position

3) Wait 24 hours

4) Check the email and see how many and what sort of replies you get.

That's what you are up against. It's a brutal and harsh reality and I highly recommend NOT bothering with craigslist. Linkdin is equal bullshit.

I'm going to hop on to this. In terms of where to get jobs, make a list of your 10-20 favorite dream places you would LOVE to work at. Most companies has their own personal listings. Bookmark them all. Check them a few times a week. Timing is HUGELY important (apply to jobs no older then 1 week old.). Companies prefer as well if you apply directly to them instead of a secondary site (like monster.com) because on those secondary sites, companies have to pay an extra "finder's fee" for hiring you. By the way, you can apply the same company multiple times (as long as there's a decent amount of space between each application.) I have a friend who applied to the same company 3 times before she landed a job.

I have been interviewing people for the past few weeks (multimedia position, but need strong web/graphic design skills). We have had a very hard time filling the position. From our interviews, I can tell you that most just aren't great designers, or think that they are much better than they actually are. Many designers rely on their skills of designing what you would see on the front page of Dribbble. I've seen people with the end product of a tutorial from sites like psdtuts/abduzeedo in their portfolio. Not good enough. You need to show me something that you have done that is creative, and be able to tell me why you designed it the way you did. Program knowledge will get you in the door, but EVERYONE that applies to these positions have that knowledge. It's what you can do with the programs that matter. A lot of candidates either have too much work to show, or too little. All I want to see is a few pieces that you can back up and explain. Ditch gmail addresses. If you have a gmail/hotmail address at the top of your resume, it's a red flag for me. Buy a domain (even your name or something similar) and get a proper email. Share your work with people other than friends and family to get an honset opinion. You might not be as good as you think, or might not be qualified for the jobs you think you deserve. Most designers get better with time and experience. Some do not, and I feel for those people. Some people just aren't cut out for graphic design, and the sooner they learn this the better as they can focus on a different path. There are lots of related fields out there. Good luck, and keep working on your craft.

Sorry you're having this problem. I'm in TX and in the same situation. I don't have the option of moving because I'm married and my husband's salary is supporting us. There are only design jobs posted once a month or so. In a year and a half I've had two interviews. Both enthusiastically promised me the job to never call again and ignore my calls to them. It's maddening.

i am still in college, but my internships have been firms taking advantage of me, and i mean big-time.

the last place (i will keep the name anonymous) took my short internship into a , we will hire you if you stay with us, but don't tell anyone. i did that 'internship' to hire for seven months before saying 'fuck this!' this is after they fired part-time contractor because they had me off the payroll working for free. F-that.

i have/starting to become discouraged about working for a firm full-time in Texas. Texas seems like a terrible place to start a career in print/digital design.

My portfolio is really weak because my internship didn't have us doing much of any real design work. Half the time me and my classmate who was also interning there were treated like errand-runners. I am not here to fold napkins for your republican convention, people!

The one thing that people really don't want to acknowledge is the complete over saturation of designers that are coming out of school. Over the last 10 years or so, Graphic Design has become the 'go-to' career for anyone remotely artistic. This is partially because of the fact that high-school counselors have told students that if they can draw and they want to make a career out of it, they should go to design school. This results in loads of new students in the field, and since colleges are going to get their money anyway, they aren't about to turn people away because there aren't enough jobs.

One of the first things I learned in college was a statistic from a professor (who was quite disheartened and is currently unemployed) who told us that out of every 10 students that graduated that year with a design degree, only 4 jobs would become available. That is including the expansion of this career field. Sucks right?

The only advice I can give is to focus on areas of design where there is a market gap. In the future, designers who can perform many complex tasks are going to be in high demand. Focus on data visualization, web development, UI design for apps. Those are the areas that are growing. Unfortunately, in my college we focused mostly on print design, and had one class on the web, so I had to teach myself. However, as a result of my classic training and new skills I developed, I was able to impress my current employer with a great leave-behind after the interview (which I think is what sealed the deal).

/rant, sorry.

P.S. To actually answer your question I was unemployed for 7 months after graduation, and filled out about 400 applications with a 2% success rate of interviews.

I am in Maryland (USA, near Washington DC), so the situation might be different here. The one thing that seems pretty constant with the majority of the people that I know with design jobs is that they knew somebody in the company first. That's how I currently have my job.

I don't know if the UK has something similar to the AIGA, but I know a lot of people who made contacts through trade organizations and from those connections found employment. Even in today's digital age, it still can be about who you know.

I'm currently finishing up my bachelors in Graphic Design in the US. I have a ton of work experience with sales and marketing and have always had my hand in design in some way. Now, I'm not nearly at your level, but I was laid off from my job in July of 2011 and I haven't been able to find work since. Every design job wants 3 years experience for entry level and out of the several hundred other apps i've filled out, I had one interview and almost no other sort of contact. It's rough.

EDIT: I should mention, I'm not just print, I can do web, I know my way around the basics of HTML and CSS and I also know how to animate and edit video.

In NYC....Not a masters, just a Bachelor's I got in 2010. I have a couple part time jobs stitched together to make ends meet. But yeah none of them are in the "industry." No agency work or anything like that... I apply to more jobs each day than the amount of cigarettes I smoke. Everyone says it gets better, and that doing shitty work or not being recognized is part of the "paying one's dues" process. I suppose I believe it. In some perverse way, reading these kind of posts make me feel better, at least that I'm/we're not alone in these desperate pursuits, that it's not because your my is shitty, or I'm untalented and too dense to realize. I'm in your exact same spot (sans the Master's degree) as are many others. So hang in there brother.

You know this but it's not always what you know, it's who you know. For this reason, there are a lot of shitty designers in quite good jobs out there. Maybe the people they know , the ones who gave them the job, could do with getting to know a better designer. Fact is, if you want to do the job you're going to have to live it. Start by getting to know people in the industries and positions that can hire you.

Maybe take off your Masters from your CV? Haha I know that is strange... But perhaps employers will be more likely to consider employing you as your pay scale would be on the lower end of the spectrum.